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“Why do you think I give a damn about your kid?” she asked, resigned to the fact that the sliver of hope that had lived inside her for so long was dying. “You’re not a stupid woman,” she continued, staring her mother directly in the eye now, refusing to hide anything any longer. “Why do you think I care?”
The anger that vibrated in the air around her mother only rose, her tension level increasing.
Behind Natches, Dawg Mackay stepped closer.
“Come on, kids, let’s play nice on the playground,” he chided them, and Angel and Chaya faced off.
A mother’s fury and a daughter’s determination.
“You’re not answering me, Mrs. Mackay,” she pointed out, that bleak, hollow pain that raged inside her making her voice huskier.
Chaya’s lip lifted in another sneer. “Girl, you’re testing my patience.” Disdain filled her voice and her expression. “And you don’t want to do that.”
No, she didn’t want to do that, but there was no doubt she would.
Poor Momma, she thought painfully. She shouldn’t have to suffer a child she didn’t like.
“Bliss is my sister.” She made herself say the words, emotion nearly overwhelming her as hope rushed through her in waves, when she’d believed she had no hope left inside her.
“Whoa, fuck me . . .” Dawg jumped back from her even as her mother turned quickly to stare at Natches in shock.
She thought Angel belonged to Natches?
Angel would have laughed if everything inside her didn’t seem to freeze at the knowledge.
Natches did laugh, though, his amusement genuine.
“Good try, sweetheart,” he drawled. “I was a bastard, but I was a careful one.”
Chaya turned back slowly, moving farther away from Angel, her eyes narrowing on her.
“You’re not my father,” she agreed. Now wouldn’t that suck? “Too bad, though. I think you’re a hell of a one.”
Behind her, Tracker shifted closer as Chaya’s expression immediately turned icy cold. Dangerous.
“Then how is Bliss your sister?” Natches demanded, the compliment not even registering. “Kid, you need to take this act somewhere else. Fast.”
Angel didn’t answer. She stared back at her mother silently, willing her to say something, to welcome her, acknowledge her. Anything.
See me, she wanted to scream. Please, Momma. Please.
“That’s not possible.” Natches’s voice lowered, became harsher, colder as he seemed to realize who Angel claimed as a parent. “Chaya has no other children.”
And Chaya wasn’t speaking. Her gaze kept moving over her face, but she didn’t speak.
“Is Bliss your only child, Mrs. Mackay?” Angel could feel the fear beginning to build.
Once she’d followed Tracker and Chance into a category five hurricane and that hadn’t been as frightening as the fear congealing in her belly at the knowledge that her mother was silently yet very firmly rejecting her.
Angel swallowed against the lump in her throat. She’d thought nothing could hurt so bad as having her mother call her a killer, as knowing she didn’t want the child that had so loved her. Seeing the proof of it hurt worse, though.
“Stop this!” Natches ordered her with grating fury as his expression hardened into lines of savage mercilessness. “Get her the fuck out of here, Tracker, before I kill her myself!”
Before he killed her . . . Yeah, he could be protective like that, she’d heard.
She felt Tracker’s hand on her arm, his fingers firm.
“Angel, let’s go,” he whispered gently as she fought to accept this reality.
